Latest news with #Rwanda
The National
42 minutes ago
- Business
- The National
Syrian diaspora hopes AI can help rebuild country's tech future
Syrians abroad are hoping the momentum of their transition to democracy could create a tech hub in their country devastated by more than a decade of war. Syria lacks some of the basic infrastructure required for technological companies to thrive, such as good quality internet, data centres and access to the cloud. But experts believe Syrians could skip some of the hurdles that countries previously faced when building their technology sectors, thanks to the recent rapid evolution of AI, which could do most of the legwork. We're trying to focus on upskilling first Ranim Alwair 'We are capable more than any time before. Now, all the AI technology will just enable more productivity,' said London-based AI scientist Rami Al Batal, speaking at a tech event for Syrians organised by Sync in London. Some are hopeful the country could build a tech hub similar to those that emerged from Rwanda after the genocide, and Estonia after the collapse of the Soviet Union, according to the computer scientist Rafa'at Zarka. 'The common thread in both (Estonia and Rwanda) was a clear digital vision,' Mr Zarka, a Syrian working in London for Microsoft, told The National. Rwanda's capital Kigale is now home to the African continent's leading start-ups, and Estonia has a track record of building tech unicorns including Skype in 2005, the taxi service provider Bolt, and payment platform Wise. 'They had limited resources, but they could go far with smart digital investment and cloud partnerships, with smart regulations to make it easier for public-private collaboration.' Though US, UK and EU sanctions were removed earlier this year, hesitation around investing in the country remains. US President Donald Trump's order to ease sanctions still needs to come into effect. Until then, Syrians will be unable to access the cloud, and western financial services continue to be hesitant about transacting in Syria. The Syrian Ministry of Information is believed to have contacted cloud providers to request access until then. 'Now sanctions are lifted we should put more pressure to get access to cloud infrastructure,' Dr Al Batal said. 'We need to ask foreign governments about how to extend venture capital zones to cover Syria. I know it is still higher risk, but it's now up to us to provide the stability and to prove how productive we are.' Nour Al Khatib, a Dubai-based telecoms leader at MTN, said international support for Syria was crucial in bringing the country out of its isolation and rebuilding trust. 'We have a historical moment, to collaborate with the UK government, as well as the people, in order to support Syrians in the journey of rebuilding the country, and having our Syria back and online again,' she told The National. Ms Al Khatib is a board member of Sync, a Silicon Valley based platform for Syrians in tech, which organised the London event. 'Syria was offline for 54 years. Now Syria is back online, just give Syria and Syrians a hand in order to operate the way that it should be operating,' she said. Syria can also rely on the experience of tech professionals from its diaspora. Among them is Nour Shaker, the British-Syrian founder of SpatialX, an AI-powered cancer diagnostics application. In Silicon Valley's Palo Alto, Bassel Ojjeh – a founder of Sync – is the CEO telecoms software product LigaData. London-based architect Ranim Alwair has been advising Syrian ministries under the new administration on how to integrate AI into their daily work. She is working on a pilot project to train local government workers in Damascus in AI, and recently gave workshops to the Ministry of Transport. 'We're trying to focus on upskilling first in the short term, then automation. Syria is really falling decades behind,' she said. 'We're trying to get officials exposed to the knowledge of AI so that they get to know how useful it is to use AI to automate tedious tasks, and how much time and money it will save,' she said. She has urged government officials to bring overseas consultants to get advice on their digital infrastructure, and to teach more people English so that they can access technology products more easily. 'One official told me that employees really need upskilling from the basics, using a laptop, sending an email as well, how to use internet safely, and so on so forth. So we're trying to put programmes at the moment to start from these stages,' she said. Alwair fled Homs in 2012 with husband, mother and two small children after her father was killed during a siege of the city by the Syrian army. 'We lost everything,' she said, recalling how they left in haste with a small suitcase. After coming to the UK, she applied to study architecture at University College London. She never imagined at that time that she would one day be playing a role in building Syria's future government and institutions. 'I feel really happy and excited that I am delivering whatever I learnt in the UK, in Arabic to home country. Up until now it feels like a dream,' she said. Members of the Syrian community in London say they are able to work together for the first time in over a decade. Laila Chamsi-Bacha, an event planner and founder of Khayo, a start-up specialising in promoting Middle Eastern food, said that the community had become divided after 2011 – with few people trusting each other. 'It's really exciting after all these years to be able to come together as Syrians. The Syrian community felt like it was more and more fragmented. But now the walls aren't listening any more,' she said.
Reuters
44 minutes ago
- Business
- Reuters
Rwanda's Kagame appoints central banker as new prime minister
KIGALI, July 24 (Reuters) - President Paul Kagame has replaced Rwanda's long-serving prime minister, naming the deputy governor of the central bank, who was once pardoned for a corruption conviction, to the role responsible for the government's day-to-day operations. The appointment of Justin Nsengiyumva, the former prime secretary at the education ministry who holds a PhD in economics from the University of Leicester, was announced by the office of the government spokesperson in a post on X late on Wednesday. The post did not say why the incumbent, Edouard Ngirente, was dropped. Ngirente, who had been prime minister since 2017, thanked Kagame on X, writing: "This journey has been deeply enriching." Kagame appointed Nsengiyumva as deputy governor at the National Bank of Rwanda earlier this year. Nsengiyumva's official biography says he has worked for the British government, including as senior economist for the Office of Rail and Road. Prior to his work in the UK, Nsengiyumva served as permanent secretary at Rwanda's education ministry. In 2008, while serving in that role, he was arrested for alleged corruption and later convicted, according to the state-owned New Times newspaper. Kagame pardoned him in March 2023 alongside 380 others in unrelated cases, the New Times reported. A Rwandan government spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for a comment. Rwanda last held elections in 2024 when Kagame was re-elected with 99.18% of the vote, extending his near quarter-century in office.
Bloomberg
44 minutes ago
- Politics
- Bloomberg
Rwanda's Kagame Names Justin Nsengiyumva as New Prime Minister
Rwandan President Paul Kagame appointed Justin Nsengiyumva as the nation's new prime minister, according to an announcement on the government communication service's X account. Nsengiyumva replaces Edouard Ngirente, who was in the role for eight years.
Coin Geek
5 hours ago
- Business
- Coin Geek
Rwanda's $200M digitalization project halfway done: official
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... In Rwanda, the government says its Rwf280 billion ($200 million) Digital Acceleration Project is halfway done. Speaking to lawmakers recently, the CEO of the Rwanda Information Society Authority (RISA), Innocent Bagamba Muhizi, said the project is 55% complete, with the government targeting completion by 2026. The World Bank funds the project and aims to digitalize public services and integrate emerging technology to improve education, health, and agriculture. It supports access to smart devices in marginalized communities and nationwide digital literacy programmes. It also funds connectivity for remote government offices, schools, and hospitals. The project further aims to boost digital ID uptake in the country, channeling $39.3 million to the cause. 'The goal is to enable citizens to carry out secure digital transactions—like opening a bank account—remotely, using digital IDs instead of physical cards. This will be supported by an application installed on smartphones that authenticates users via biometric data,' Muhizi said. Rwanda ranks as one of Africa's leaders in digitalization. The East African nation ranked third in the African Leapfrog Index, behind South Africa and Kenya, in digital public services. A separate report by the International Data Center Authority ranked Rwanda first on the continent for digital readiness. UK welcomes eVisas, digital ID transition faces trust setback Elsewhere, the U.K. government has transitioned from physical visa documents to eVisas to boost security and reduce processing times. However, the Labour administration's push to transition to digital IDs is facing pushback, with public distrust emerging as the greatest hurdle. The U.K. Visas and Immigration Department (UKVI) has been rolling out the eVisa for nearly two years. Since March last year, over 4.3 million people have received the eVisa; between August and December last year, the department registered 3.2 million new accounts. On July 15, UKVI officially announced that it had transitioned into a digital immigration system. It touted some benefits such as enhanced security since the digital document can't be tampered with, reduced costs and wait times, and faster processing at U.K. borders. However, while the transition into the eVisa system was swift and smooth, the U.K. government's push for digital IDs has been marred by political controversy and public backlash. UK's digital ID hindered by public distrust The U.K. has been exploring a digital ID for years to keep up with rapid advancements in the digital economy, especially with its peers like France and Germany moving fast. Under Prime Minister Keir Starmer, the Labour administration has ramped up its predecessor's efforts since taking over last year. In April, a group of Labour MPs under the Labour Growth Group wrote an open letter calling for digital ID to improve public services and mitigate the country's immigration challenge. The lawmakers noted that a digital ID would bolster the government's development agenda and called on the administration 'not to miss this opportunity.' More recently, former Chief of Secret Intelligence Service, Alex Younger, told the BBC, 'It's absolutely obvious to me that people should have a digital identity.' However, multiple studies show that public distrust of a digital ID remains high. Even leaders who support the initiative have called for stringent oversight to avoid abuse. One of these is Harriet Harman, a former deputy leader of the Labour Party. While she acknowledged that it would deter illegal immigration to the U.K., she says people's support 'depends on whether or not you think the state is going to actually overstep the mark and oppress people.' The government's approach hasn't helped. Last December, it ran an ad on local outlets that painted critics of the digital ID as outdated and clumsy. It didn't go down well with the majority of U.K. citizens. The digital ID faces similar public distrust as the proposed digital pound. The central bank indicated on Tuesday that it's now mulling shelving the plans for the CBDC to focus on supporting private-sector digital payment initiatives. Distrust of the government in the U.K. remains among the highest in the world, a 2024 study revealed, with only Colombia recording a steeper drop year over year. Watch: Digital identity is a core part of Web3—here's why title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen="">
Reuters
20 hours ago
- Politics
- Reuters
Rwandan rebels' fate clouds Trump's vision for mineral-rich Congo
July 23 (Reuters) - Moves to end fighting in eastern Congo that are essential to U.S. President Donald Trump's plans for a mining bonanza in the region are meant to get underway by Sunday, but the future of a small rebel group has emerged as one of the major obstacles. A U.S.-brokered peace agreement signed last month by the Congolese and Rwandan foreign ministers was designed to halt violence that escalated this year with a lightning advance in the Democratic Republic of Congo by M23 rebels. Rwanda denies allegations from the U.N. and Western governments that it is fighting alongside the M23 rebels to gain access to Congo's minerals. Rwanda says its troops are there to tackle what it describes as an existential threat from thousands of Rwandan Hutu rebels known as the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR). Security experts and diplomats say the FDLR, which includes remnants of Rwanda's former army and militias that carried out the 1994 Rwandan genocide, boasts only a few hundred combatants and is not a significant battlefield force. But the peace agreement explicitly requires Congo to "neutralise" the FDLR as Rwanda withdraws from Congolese territory, underscoring the group's importance to the fate of Trump's diplomacy. Both the Congolese operations against the FDLR and the Rwandan withdrawal are supposed to start by Sunday and conclude by the end of September. U.N. experts said in a report this month that Rwanda, along with M23, is trying to seize control of mineral-rich territory. Kigali responded that the presence of the "genocidal" FDLR "necessitates the defence posture in our border areas". The U.N. experts also accused the Congolese military of relying on the FDLR in its fight against M23. A spokesperson for Congo's government did not respond to a request for comment on that question, but Kinshasa has said it is on board with ensuring any threat posed by the FDLR is "definitively eradicated", including by voluntary disarmament. It has also accused Rwanda of using the FDLR as a pretext for deploying on Congolese territory. Congolese researcher Josaphat Musamba said it was not possible for Congo to rid the region of FDLR fighters given that M23 holds much of the territory where the FDLR now operates. "It would be feasible if the Rwandan-backed rebellion were not active and threatening to conquer other territories," said Musamba, a Ph.D. candidate at Ghent University who is from eastern Congo and studies the conflict there. Jason Stearns, a political scientist at Simon Fraser University in Canada who specialises in Africa's Great Lakes region, said lack of progress against the FDLR could be cited by Rwanda as a reason to keep its troops deployed in eastern Congo past September, throwing off Washington's timeline. "It would be fairly easy for Rwanda to claim that Congo is not abiding by its side of the deal - that its operations against the FDLR are not serious enough, have not been successful enough - and therefore to drag its feet," Stearns said. A spokesperson for Rwanda's government did not respond to a request for comment on its approach to the FDLR. Rwandan President Paul Kagame said on July 4 that Rwanda was committed to implementing the deal, but that it could fail if Congo did not live up to its promises to neutralise the FDLR. Trump said on July 9 the Congolese and Rwandan presidents would travel to the United States in the "next couple of weeks" to sign the peace agreement. They are also expected to sign bilateral economic packages that would bring billions of dollars of investment into countries rich in tantalum, gold, cobalt, copper, lithium and other minerals. There has been no further word on a date. While Washington has hosted negotiations between Congo and Rwanda, Qatar has hosted separate direct talks between Congo and M23. On Saturday the two sides agreed to sign a separate peace deal by August 18. M23 currently has no concrete plans to withdraw from the territory it controls. The FDLR has urged Trump not to green-light a Congolese offensive against it. A July 2 letter to Trump from Victor Byiringiro, the FDLR's acting president, said attacking the FDLR would jeopardise the safety of Congolese civilians as well as more than 200,000 Rwandan refugees. In written responses to questions from Reuters, FDLR spokesperson Cure Ngoma said only "a frank, sincere, and inclusive dialogue among Rwandans" could bring peace, though Rwanda has repeatedly ruled out such talks with the group. Trump expects Congo and Rwanda to abide by the peace deal "which will foster lasting stability and prosperity in the region," Anna Kelly, a White House spokesperson, said in response to Reuters questions about the FDLR's future. "All armed groups must lay down their arms and work within the framework of the peace process." The fighting has killed thousands and displaced hundreds of thousands more this year, while escalating the risk of a return to the kind of full-scale regional war which led to the deaths of millions of Congolese in 1998-2003.
